On Wednesday 12th September, Tower Hamlets Development Committee deferred a decision to grant planning consent for a new hotel on the Balls Brothers site, Cambridge Heath Road and the corner of Paradise Row.
Members were concerned at the design of part of the building which they felt would have clashed with the Museum of Childhood and the remaining Georgian Town Houses opposite St John's Church. Whereas part of the design was in brick which would have blended in with neighbouring buildings, part was to be a design which planners described as "composite cladding" and was at one point described as the meeting as being complementary to the canopy of the adjoining petrol station.
Committee member, Cllr Peter Golds, said that this clashed with existing buildings in a conservation area and members deferred the scheme to enable the applicant to bring forward a vista that reflected these concerns.
After the meeting Cllr Golds added, this site is part of the east end heritage, it faces the Museum of Childhood, adjoins some beautiful town houses and of course looks towards Bethnal Green Station, where the worse civilian deaths of the last war tragically happened.
Paradise Row was immortalised by Alex Stephens in his cockney song "On Mother Kelly's Doorstep" - which is even more poignant because Mother Kelly was an actual person from Paradise Row. Bethnal Green deserves better than this and I am sure that after the meeting last week the applicant, will produce an exterior design that blends in with this area"